The Times of Malta front page from August 7, 1975, featuring the story ‘Libya explosion victims brought to Malta: “We were like a family,” survivors cry’.

An engineer who had been standing not far from an explosion off Libya that killed four Maltese in 1975 still remembers vividly the mushrooming cloud of smoke and the blackened corpses.

The tragedy features in the published memoirs of Roger Ley, who, 40 years ago, was working as a gas turbine mechanic and saw the blast on August 3.

“It looked like an atomic explosion, a perfect mushroom cloud with the Francis Holmes at the base. I had not heard the explosion over the noise of the turbines that I was working on,” Roger Ley write in his book A horse in the morning.

The publication is a collection of accounts, peppered with anecdotes, including Mr Ley’s performing with comedian Tony Hancock and his dramatic encounter with the racing driver Graham Hill.

Recounting salient episodes in his life, ranging from his brief “interaction” with the British royal family as a newborn to life at 66, the failed astronaut’s collection of memories is being sold in aid of charity.

He dedicates a whole chapter to his recollection of the Francis Holmes blast when he was working at the Zueitina oil and gas terminal.

There were 16 people on the ship when the explosion happened at 10.20am as the vessel was about three miles off Libya. Eleven were Maltese, four of whom died. Two Britons were also killed.

Two mechanics went on board to load the bodies. Sometime later, I asked one of them how he felt about it and he said he was still having nightmares

When the bodies of Michael Bonett and Michael Vella, both from Sliema, were brought to Malta 40 years ago to the day, the Times of Malta reported that a young man, one of the survivors, stumbled down the aircraft steps and lay sobbing heavily on the ground. “We were like a family,” the survivors said when they landed in Malta, where anxious wives and relatives welcomed them.

Roger Ley’s published memoir A horse in the morning includes his recollection of an explosion off Libya in 1975 that killed four Maltese men.

The sad crowd at the airport Arrivals Hall included heartbroken parents, relatives and friends tearfully waiting for the corpses of the deceased. One of these, Mr Vella, had left for Libya just a week before he died.

The other casualties were John Bondin of Valletta, Carmel Sammut of Sliema and John McClellan and Barry Caire, both from the UK.

The master of the ship, who was on leave when tragedy struck, told this newspaper that the force of the explosion was such that a driver ended up on the bridge and the engineer and the captain were found on the boat deck. The boatswain and diving superintendent were thrown about 300 metres away from the ship.

Mr Ley witnessed this from the shore. It “looked like a nuclear explosion” and there was little to be done, except taking the body bags and bringing the dead and injured ashore.

Two bodies were found floating, two were washed ashore and another two blackened corpses were found on deck. Two mechanics went on board the stricken ship to load the bodies. “Sometime later, I asked one of them how he felt about it and he said he was still having nightmares,” Mr Ley recounts in his book. The vessel still lies partially buried at the beach in Zueitina.

A horse in the morning is available on Amazon as a Kindle download, and the paperback will be out in a few weeks. All profits will go to the Smile Train charity for children with facial deformities.

Mr Ley, a graduate engineer and teacher from the UK, believes the book could be of interest to those working in the oil industry and others interested in the olden days.

Since the incident, Mr Ley has been to Malta on holiday with his wife and two sons and remembers the love of the Maltese for children. “I always remember getting on the buses, the ones with the holy pictures and statues. As soon as you got on, if there were no free seats, people would just take your children off you and give them sweets. It was lovely,” he recalled.